Archive By Author - Susan Thacker

Barton Community College has been running out of room at its Grandview Plaza location, and a larger site is needed soon, college administrators told the BCC Board of Trustees Thursday. The owner of the building BCC has leased for the last five years has agreed to build a new wing for a long-term rental commitment from the college.

The Great Bend Convention & Visitors Bureau is expanding its presence on the Internet with a mobile website and a page on TripAdvisor.com. Both were launched in December, said Cris Collier, president of the Visitors Bureau.

Back for the third year, the Gun and Knife Show drew a crowd Saturday at the Great Bend Expo. Anthony Lutz, a promoter for event sponsor U.S. Weapons, based in Manchester, Iowa, said they've seen a spike in attendance at their shows in recent months.

Great Bend's Brit Spaugh Zoo received eight new animals in 2012, not counting rehabilitation birds. The year-end report from Zoo Director Scott Gregory also notes that three agoutis were born at the zoo. An agouti is a burrowing rodent.

Great Bend residents looking for a place to dispose of Christmas trees can use the city compost site, but they need to remove all tinsel, hooks and decorations, said Street Superintendent Mike Crawford. If the tree is in a bag, the bag also needs to be removed.

In a novel by Umberto Eco, a character comments on the long list of rules imposed on the Knights Templar in the Middle Ages. "From prohibitions you can tell what people normally do. It's a way of drawing a picture of daily life."

ALBERT - The Rev. Arthur Crider doesn't have a congregation, but he and his wife Mindy do have an evangelical Christian ministry in Barton County. In January they plan to launch a series of public events that will let more people know about "Critter Ministries." The first one will be at 6:30 p.m. on Jan. 11 at the Best Western Angus Inn Courtyard at 2920 10th St. in Great Bend.

A teenage boy suffered major burns Sunday night after playing with fireworks inside a Barton Hills residence. The Barton County Sheriff's Office reports the fire at 646 North Homestead started around 10:20 p.m. when Brennen Donovan, 13, and a 15-year-old boy were playing with fireworks and caught a mattress on fire.

Children of the staff at Harper Camperland in Great Bend greeted representatives from the Golden Belt Humane Society and the Brit Spaugh Zoo on Thursday, presenting each with a $5,000 check from the business and its owners, Dan and Alicia Lear.

Most people who have heard of Title IX associate the term with gender equality in school athletics, but the federal act is much more than that. Angie Maddy, dean of Student Services at Barton Community College, recently provided college trustees with a status report on BCC compliance.

A local man won't be one of the first colonists on Mars. Grady Bolding, 27, of Great Bend, was one of more than 200,000 people who applied to become an astronaut with Mars One, a Netherlands-based company that intends to begin sending people to Mars by 2024. All of those applicants knew it would be a one-way trip.

News that the Great Bend Public Library was spending more than $762,012.92 on a geothermal heating and air conditioning system shocked the city council members, who wrote the check earlier this month. It was probably out of frustration that city councilman Dana Dawson asked whether the library will even be needed in the future.

The house at 207 Plum St. was heavily damaged by fire early Friday, for the second time in two years. After investigation by the Great Bend Fire Department and the Kansas Fire Marshal's Office, police were asked to take an arson case.

Recently, during Jeffrey Chapman's two-week trial on first-degree murder charges, the Great Bend Tribune showed photos of Chapman walking to the Barton County Courthouse in the presence of Barton County Sheriff's Officers. Because he was wearing modern constraints not visible to the naked eye, some people assumed he posed a flight risk and wondered what law enforcement officers were thinking.